The Swifting Past
by SwiftyKaz
Summary: Swifty Kick is a stallion that had a troubled life and had hardly anyone to turn to. Martial Arts is the thing he is ever good at, but whenever provoked, his inner rage takes over. Follow this tale of Swifty Kick on his discovery for inner peace. OC Story & First Fanfic.
1. Chapter 1 The Beginning

Chapter Summary: This chapter starts the story explaining Swifty Kick's past and his anger.

This starts with a stallion called Swifty Kick, who had yet another hard day at school; he was struggling to learn in his lessons, he was being ignored by teachers and other students other than his brother, Shadow Beat and his friend Dashing Featherblade. But worst of all, he was being bullied. This isn't the first time this happened to Swifty, he was constantly being insulted, he sometimes had stuff stolen and even beaten up; sometimes for even defending others from them. Swifty has learnt to deal with it as they just want him gone from the school for good, just because he was one of the first stallions to get their cutie marks and they got jealous of it. This bullying as gotten as far as having reports of violence that cause many injuries. Swifty also has a case of being angry and hot-headed so easily, which made him the prime victim of this bullying, he was so sick of it that he just wished that he could make it go away forever.

However, on this particular day, one moment would leave a mark on Swiftys life forever. After a long and hard day at school, Shadow Beat was walking out of the music store in Ponyville and was returning home with an album he has been meaning to buy for a while. He took his usual route through the park when he saw 3 stallions that looks menacing, and 1 stallion that was armed with a knife. The 4 stallions looked at him hard, and then ran up to him which 3 of them pinned Shadow to the wall, making him drop the album. Shadow had a face of panic and was confused about what was happening, until the armed stallion walks up to Shadow and whispers something in his ear.

"I'm going to make him regret for what happens here. He should have left when he had the chance."

Shadow looks on in fear as the armed stallion gets his knife out and lowers it to Shadows cutie mark, rubbing the knife gently against it. The armed stallion readied himself to slice it off as Shadow closed his eyes as he was about to endure the torture that he would not heal from.

Just when it was sure that the cutie mark was off, Swifty comes around the corner trying to find his brother; witnessing what was happening. Swifty at that point was so full of rage and anger that he dashed towards the armed stallion and kicked him to the head, causing him to fall to the ground. The other 3 tried to attack Swifty, but they were hit before they could even react and Swifty just put them to the floor and knocked them out. The armed stallion gets up and attacks Swifty with a knife from behind, leaving him with a mark on the back of his left ear. The armed stallion tries to attack Swifty the second time, but Swifty just grabs his arms, twists it around causing it to snap, making him drop the knife. He then steps past the armed stallion and kicks him to the back of the legs, causing him to fall to the ground. The armed stallion, struggling to get back up, attempts to attack Swifty, but Swifty just grabs his head and twists it around, causing it to snap and the armed stallion just falls to the floor, lifeless.

Shadow, who was just sitting against the wall throughout the entire fight, was shocked at what has just transpired. He had saw Swifty go into rage and cause injuries before, but never has anything like this has been this twisted and chaotic. He tries to look at Swifty, but all he sees was pure anger and corruption, and then he sees him run off before he could say anything. Shadow picks up his album, which luckily hasn't been damaged at all and runs after Swifty knowing that this will not turn out well in the next few weeks to come. He gets out of the park and he just stands there, watching Swifty beating up and knocking out people, even throwing a few around. Shadow, seeing what Swifty is becoming, tries to stop him from causing more damage by pinning him to the ground; but all he gets in return is being thrown over the shoulder to the ground and his arm twisted. Shadow, knowing that not only is his arm is broken, but also that nothing can stop Swifty. But when all hope is lost, a bright light blinds him and everyone else. The light disappears and he sees a white alicorn in the sky and he silently curses himself, knowing that it was Princess Celestia.

Princess Celestia looks around at the scene in place, accessing the damage. She then looks at the black stallion, or else known as Swifty and lands softly onto the ground. She never knew what total chaos looked like since Discord's return, coming from one stallion. Before she knew it, Swifty drops the guy he was beating up and runs straight after Celestia. The other ponies look in fear, as they can imagine what he will do to her. But to everyone's surprise, Celestia lights up her horn and performs a spell that freezes Swifty in place. Celestia then performs another spell that repaired the damage done by Swifty. Celestia then walks up to Swifty, who is still frozen, and has a better look at the black stallion. Out of nowhere, a purple unicorn with a book in hooves or else known as Twilight Sparkle appears next to Celestia, wondering what had happened and why she was here. Twilight looks at the stallion that is frozen in front of her and sees Celestia observing the stallion; Twilight then began to speak and said:

"Princess, why is this stallion seem to be frozen?".

Celestia looks at Twilight and said:

"All will be said in time, my student. For now I want to talk to this stallion, so can you meet me at the library?"

Twilight says nothing and just teleports away back to the library. Celestia then performs a spell that unfroze Swifty, watching as the ice melts away and sees Swifty break free.

Swifty looks around in confusion, wondering what happened here when he sees the Princess and he quickly bows to the Princess in politeness. Celestia just chuckles and says "No need to be formal today". Swifty gets up from the ground and then asks a question to Celestia:

"Princess Celestia, what just happened here?"

Celestia smiles at him and said, "It would seem that you were out of control and caused destruction around the town, luckily I managed to intervene before anything else happened". Swifty, knowing that what he has done was from his own anger and corruption, sadly looks at the Princess and said:

"I am so sorry, Princess. I knew I had these problems before but never to a degree this high."

He then closed his eyes and says

"If I need to be punished for this chaos, then I await for whatever you have planned". Celestia just chuckles again and says

"No need to worry about your punishment. This was just due to your problems that you couldn't resolve."

Celestia then thinks of an idea and then says:

"I have an idea of how to cure your anger. I could take you to Canterlot and train you in the Royal Guards to not only cure your anger, but teach you other techniques others cannot."

Swifty was shocked at this offer, and prepares to think of an answer. He then said:

"I reckon that would help me Princess, I would like to take your offer."

Celestia then began to tell Swifty more.

"There is also more. Once you accept, you have to stay in Canterlot with the Royal Guard for a year and you cannot leave until then."

Swifty then looked shocked again, and just went into a deeper thought. He could not just leave like that. He still had school to finish and he would have to abandon his brother. Swifty shared a deep bond with Shadow Beat. They would help each other out in a heartbeat, they would hang around together and they listened to the same music all day. Suddenly out of nowhere, Shadow comes from behind and puts his hoof on Swiftys shoulder and just said:

"Brother, it's okay. I can manage on my own for a year. You need this. I'll even give you a gift when you come back, I promise."

Swifty, with tears in his eyes, looks at Shadow and just goes to hug him, saying in his ears:

"I'll come back bro, I'll bet my life on it and I'll write to you every day. I promise".

Shadow returns the hug and they both remained there for a minute. Everyone except Celestia, who just smiles, had tears in their eyes as they see the two brothers in a brotherly love embrace. Swifty breaks up and looks at Celestia and tells her:

"I'm ready to go."

Celestia then performs a spell that teleports herself and Swifty away. Shadow just waves in the air, knowing that Swifty will be back. Swifty's last thoughts before being teleported are the challenges ahead for him and the one song that he listens to with Shadow.


	2. Chapter 2 The First Day

Chapter Summary: This chapter explains Swifty's first day in the Royal Guards when he meets new friends (and rivals).

A blinding light appeared in the palace halls in Canterlot, and then something came out from that light, a white solar alicorn who goes by the name of Princess Celestia. She takes a step out of the way as something else came out from the light, a black and red stallion that goes by the name of Swifty Kick. After the light disappears behind him, Swifty takes a look around at the scenery he was placed in. The Royal Palace Halls, with walls that's been like ruins, and floors polished that shined like a diamond-crested ring at a jewellery shop. Swifty was in excitement that he was in the Royal Palace. Only ponies that had official business with the Princesses or Royal Guards were allowed in the Palace. The white alicorn chuckles at the face of the black stallion as he looked like he saw some famous pony. Celestia took this time to speak:

"I can see that you like the look at my palace."

Swifty broke from his trance and turns to the princess and responds "This place is marvellous Princess; this is truly a one-of-an-kind place to watch at night on top of the hill". Celestia looked at him after his statement and suggested:

"I guess it is nice to look at after dusk, but we can talk about it after you present yourself to the Royal Guards. The sun is beginning to fall so you still have some time left of the day."

Swifty, in delight that he would get to meet his heroes when he was a colt, followed the princess to the training room. As he walks around the palace with the princess, he began to think about his brother:

'Shadow would love to come here; he would find a nice, quiet room and lie down on the bed as well as listen to his music. I'm sure that he will be fine without me, he's a fighter so he can manage without me.'

Without realising, when Swifty's thought disappeared, they were already at the training room. He took this moment to see the Royal Guards training young recruits in different sections such as self-defence, weapons training, sparring and hand-to-hand training. He never thought that it would this much awesome, and to say that he would be doing this for a whole year. He never got this excited before, and this would show why. The princess laughed at his amazement and told the black stallion:

"I could watch you being trained here, but I'm afraid I have other business to attend to, I suggest you talk to the captain to start your training, I hope your first day goes well for you."

The Princess then smiled after finishing speaking. Swifty returns the smiles and responded back to Celestia:

"I understand Princess; I hope the same goes for you".

The princess then proceeded to cast a spell and teleported quickly trotted to the captain to get signed up, when he saw a green earth pony being surrounded by other earth ponies. Swifty thought that this pony was going to get it, but as it turns out, the green pony smashed his front hooves to the ground, causing the other earth ponies to fall to the ground. The green pony slowly trotted to the others and they quickly got up and ran away. Swifty, after that display of performance, gets to the captain. He asked the captain:

"Is this where I sign up for the Royal Guards?"

The captain quickly turns around to face the black stallion and studies him hard. The captain then prepares to speak up, but then a royal guard comes up to the captain and whispers something in his ear. After he was finished, the captain dismisses the guard and begins to speak:

"I've just been told that by order of the princess, you are to start training immediately. Is that true boy?"

The captain had an old, rough voice which made Swifty think that the captain has been in the Royal Guard for many decades. The black stallion nods to the captain's statement, which makes the captain speak out again:

"Well son, you must know this isn't easy like you have been told before, especially for a full year. You must show full commitment and determination in order to succeed. Are you sure you want to do this son?"

Swifty, with a fire in his heart which shows that this is his chance to fulfil his dream, answers back to the captain:

"Yes I am sir, let's do this!"

The captain looks at him again and says:

"Very well, before you train with us, you must show your strength and skill"

He then points to the green pony and says:

"You must fight against him in the ring for 5 minutes, and if you can manage to stand your ground, it will prove that you are capable of defending one's self."

Swifty at first expressed a face of worry, but then it faded to a face of a confident, brave warrior. The black stallion said nothing more to the captain and trotted to the ring, acknowledging to the captain that he will face the test. Swifty enters the ring, trots to the green pony so they meet face-to-face. The green pony was bigger and stronger than Swifty and had a cutie mark of a tensed fist risen up like what a rebel army would have. The green pony stood on his two legs, raised his foreleg back and was about to knock out the black stallion. However he blocks the oncoming punch, grabs the hoof, put it behind him like he was being restrained and kicked one of his legs that kept him standing whilst taking his own foreleg and wrapping it around the green pony's neck in a sleeper hold. Swifty dragged the green pony down to the ground, he let go of the green pony's foreleg that he restrained and proceeded to hit him in the head, putting the tough green pony down. All that happened in a matter of seconds, everyone was shocked that a newcomer who had some experience had defeated a tough strong pony that spent some years in the Royal Guard.

The captain gasped and was shocked as well; no one had been able to defeat the green pony before in a while. Swifty, right after the fight, left the ring to the captain, and he could tell that he was surprised at him. Swifty grinned to himself and walked to the line of ponies that have passed the test. The captain regained his senses and walked to the ponies, prepares to give them a speech to the new recruits, he opened his mouth and prepared to give out a speech to them in:

"Mares and stallions, you have all gone through a face of fear and also prevailed. You have all passed the test to join the society and ponies that are the Royal Guard. However, what you have faced was only a part of what the true fear is in Equestria. We can make you become the ponies that can rise up to face this fear and push it back out of Equestria forever!"

All the ponies stomped their hooves to the ground and cheered when he finished his speech, nevertheless the captain carried on:

"You will all be bunked on this floor in the palace. You are allowed out of the palace, but never beyond Canterlot. Now report to your assigned rooms I'll be giving you and await further orders. Training starts tomorrow at 0600 hours, dismissed!"

All the ponies then trot to the captain, collecting a piece of paper each which shows that ponies name and what room number they stay at. When Swifty goes to collect his piece of paper, the captain glares at the black stallion hard, making Swifty feel uncomfortable but Swifty dismisses it and trots on.

Before he left the training room, he walks over to the green pony that was still on the floor and helps him back up. The green pony looks at Swifty in confusion, but the black stallion ignores it and begins to talk to the green pony:

"Hey there, you okay? You took quite a hit, I guess I didn't realise how hard I hit. Sorry about that."

The green pony was surprised at him as his first thought was that he was back to finish him off, but he denied that thought and listened to Swifty:

"I saw what you did to that group of ponies, and it was awesome. I have never seen such strength before. Oh, I almost forgot to ask, what's your name?"

The green pony was nervous as no one dared to ask for his name before, so he looked at the black stallion and said:

"My name... is Hard Punch. I got this name from my parents because I hit things hard with my hooves. That also got me my cutie mark."

Swifty was intrigued with Hard Punch's story and carried on listening:

"My parents decided to abandon me when I hit too much things, I had to live on the streets to survive which was the coldest years of my colthood. When I grew into a stallion, I knew I was old enough to join the Royal Guard. They took me in; I passed my initiation and got accepted as a member of the Royal Guard. Over the next few years things were getting easier for me because I had somewhere to live. But that was only the good part of it. Due to my brute strength I had not been able to make any friends. I worry myself that no-pony would accept me as a fellow friend."

Swifty could tell that Hard Punch sounded sad and upset and he felt bad for him. No-pony should be living their lives without anyone to be there for them.

Swifty, with a smile on his face, put his hoof around Hard Punch's shoulder and said to him:

"I know how you feel and I could do with a friend like you. I'll be your friend if you want me to."

Hard Punch was so excited to have somepony be his friend, that he gave Swifty a death-gripping but a happy hug. Swifty, struggling to breathe only gasped out:

"I'll...take that...as a...yes. You...can let go...now."

Hard Punch released his grip from Swifty but was still happy. Swifty managed to get up from the ground after the hug and said to the green pony:

"Well, I've got to go to bed now. So I'll see you here tomorrow and together, me and you can be partners."

Swifty walked towards the exit and waved to Hard Punch, who was waving back, and he was out of the training room. He walked toward his room down a long hallway, passing by some rooms along the way. He managed to find his room number and he opens the door to find in his room in a perfect state. His room had a king-sized bed, a desk fitted onto the wall with a mirror on it, some drawers, a bathroom that had a toilet that has a fitted toilet roll next to it and a shower with some towels. The room itself was quite small as it probably was intended to be used for one pony only. Swifty jumped onto the bed and lay down to get some sleep. He was disturbed from his sleep later on as it was the middle of night and he heard knocking on the door. He got up from his bed and walked to the door, seeing who disturbed his sleep. He opens the door to see one of the maids with a saddlepack on her back. She dropped the saddlepack onto the floor near Swifty and said:

"Forgive me for interrupting your sleep but somepony wanted to send you this."

He looked at the saddlepack and thought to himself:

'It was probably Shadow wanted to send my stuff. Having said, I never got the chance to pack anyway. Nice of him sending it to me.'

He thanked the maid and brought the saddlepack into his room whilst locking the door. He decided to unpack it in the morning as he was too tired to do anything else. He jumped back into bed and went into a deep sleep.


	3. Chapter 3 The Rivalry Part 1

Chapter Summary: This chapter introduces a new character that sparks the start of a rivalry that Swifty must overcome.

The morning came that day with the sun starting to rise over the horizon and in the palace, a certain black stallion was starting to wake up due to the fact he set the alarm clock to an appropriate time. He leaned across to check the time on the clock. 5.30am.

'Good' he thought, 'enough time for me to get a shower and get ready for the training session'.

Swifty got out of bed, groggy as hell, went over to get a cup of coffee. He got a cup, poured some coffee mix into the cup and flicked the switch to boil the kettle. Whilst Swifty was waiting for the kettle, he thought back to the bag the maid gave him last night. He went over to the bag to see what was inside the bag, almost tripping up against the stool. Just as he was about to open the bag, the kettle was ready and made a beeping noise, which startled Swifty.

'Sweet Celestia, That's one fast kettle!'

He poured the water into the cup, poured some milk in, gave it a spin and left it to cool down a bit. He then went to take a shower, hanging the towel on the rack outside the shower. What seemed like a few minutes later, he got out of the shower, dried himself with the towel and went to check the time. It was 5:50am.

'Oh crap!' he just realised that it was 10 minutes to get to the training room from his room. He got himself ready, drank a bit of his coffee and went to the training room, locking the door behind him.

'I'll have a look at the bag later, right now I need to get there before I get in trouble!' he thought whilst  
galloping as fast he could to the training room.

It was 6:00, Swifty got to the training room in the nick of time, and where the first pony he saw in there was Hard Punch, his newly-made friend from last night's session. Hard Punch saw Swifty and ran up to him, giving him a death-grip-of-a-hug.

"Hello...to you too...friend" Swifty managed to choke out.

Hard Punch then let go of Swifty and they both trotted to join the rest of the group. Once everyone was ready, the captain began to speak to the group:

"Welcome fellow ponies, to your first session of the year. Now, before we start, a year of training and hard-work will not be easy, as some fellow students found out the hard way."

Many of the students gulped, but nonetheless, the captain carried on:

"But when you put your mind into it, it will flow like the wind in the sky. There is other stuff I have to  
tell you first..."

The captain told the group about the timetable of our sessions, the tournaments they would have, any breaks they would have (so long as you didn't leave Canterlot for the year) and other stuff that he didn't hear as his mind was onto the stallion across the room, who was giving him an eagles stare, but Swifty shrugged it off and continued to listen to the captain.

"As the first part of the session, we will be giving you a physical workout to improve your physique..."

The rest of the session went on quite well, tiring and painful but quite well. The time was somewhere in the dusk and the day gone as followed: they had their warm-up session which lasted an hour. The morning session was about the students showing others their own skill (which Swifty stole the show) and then having the students pairing up with each other to follow the techniques shown (which Swifty paired himself up with Hard Punch). The afternoon session was the grappling session, that session left many students tired the most as each student tried to outperform each other (which pleased the captain). Each student looked like they would pass out in a seconds notice but they all kept their fighting spirits high and would keep going. Fortunate for them, the captain looked at the students and spoke to them:

"You have done well my students, the amount of effort and determination from you should be kept throughout each session."

The students were pleased of the captain's words, however the captain carried on:

"Fortunate for you, you still have one more session for today and this session will be at the end of each day of training. This session will truly test your combat skills and your endurance. This is the Sparring session."

The students faces were met with horrified faces when the captain announced the word Sparring.

The sparring session consisted of a 1 on 1 fight in the ring. The rules were semi-contact, no knockouts and no shots below the waist. 1 round each for 5 mins for each student and the session would last an hour. (If you work out the maths, that's 12 fights per student). Each student got randomly picked against another randomly picked student and each student was given some protective gear. Sometime into the session, when Swiftys name got picked, he looked determined to fight. His opponent at the time was the last student to be picked, which was the stallion that looked at him earlier on. The stallion was white and had black hair and matching tail. His cutie mark was of the famous Yin/Yang symbol, except the white side was black out so it almost looked like a black circle. The captain announced thename of the student, Yang. The two trotted into the ring and gave each other the bow before the match started. Yang looked at Swifty with the face of seriousness, which Swifty noticed and just sighed to himself. The bell rang and the match had started.

About 3 minutes into the match, the two were evenly matched, both traded well placed shots with perfectly displayed techniques and both were using thoughtful tactics. Swiftys tactic was Block & Counter; he would wait until their opponent stroke, block the shot and counter back with an effective hit to an exposed area of an opponent. Yang's tactic varied, because he depended on the opponent tactics and use one of his own tactics that was effective against his opponents. Swifty seemed to be enjoying himself, as he was in a mock fight with another fellow student, but at all times controlling his anger so that no pony would be seriously injured.

Yang on the other hand was the opposite; he was devastated that somepony was able to be equally skilled as him. He would not have at it no longer and suddenly exploded at Swifty, charging at him, taking him  
down to the ground and throwing strikes at the black stallion. Swifty was stunned at this whilst trying to defend himself from the attacking student. Swifty was freaked out a little as he thought back to the fight he had against the ponies that almost cut his brother up.

Then at that point, hell was unleashed as Swiftys anger took over his body and he fought back with punches of his own and managed to get Yang of him. But it didn't end there as Yang was on the floor, trying to fight back but Swifty kept attacking the white stallion which at that point caused Yang to bleed when Swifty landed a hard punch to his stout.

The captain and the guards in the room saw what was happening when Swifty attacked back and galloped into the rig to try to break up the fight. The students had faces of shock when they saw blood being spilt, even Hard Punch shivered at the sight. The captain and the guards managed to separate the two from each other, both were struggling to get free but Swifty broke free from their grip and continued to attack the white stallion but more guards came by and successfully managed to separate the two again. Swifty was dragged out of the training room but not before Yang shouted to Swifty:

"This will not be the end of this, I guarantee it!", whilst making the motion of cutting his throat with his hoof.

Swifty was getting angrier at Yang, but could not do anything about it…for now at least. When they made it to Swiftys room, they unlocked the door and dropped Swifty on the bed. The guards then proceeded to return to the training room to keep an eye on the other students whilst the captain remained in the room. He looked at Swifty hard for a few seconds, and then began to speak out:

"I can see that the princess wasn't lying about your condition. Do not worry, the princess told me about you last night. Your condition is not anything like I saw before. You are able to be more aggressive when provoked also thing clearly than what a normal pony can when angry. And you go into a trance that makes your eyes go red."

Swifty was a little surprised but nonetheless he sighed and spoke to the captain:

"Yes, all that is true. I don't know how it started, but when I get provoked, I think back to the bad stuff that happened. Like the attack against my brother yesterday. My mind would go back to that scenario and suddenly I justwant to kill anything or any pony nearby without any second thought. And that I would know what they would do before they even do it."

At that point after speaking, Swifty was in tears. The captain did nothing else but comfort the poor stallion.

After a few minutes, the captain trotted to the door and looked back to tell Swifty:

"I will go back to the training room to calm everypony down. You can get an early rest should you choose to do so."

The captain left the room, leaving Swifty alone. Swifty just lied down on his front and cried into the pillow, thinking about his parent's death (which was from a ballooning accident), his brother and all the bad things that happened to him. He did so for the next hour. He decided to check the time; it was 9:00pm. He then agreed to go to sleep, but not before checking the bag.

He opened the bag and looked at what was inside of it. There was his music player (like an MP3) with all his song on it and his earphones, also there was some books for him to read, a notepad with a pack of pencils, his childhood toy that he swore never to leavewithout and lastly a photo inside a photo frame, which said:

'Never forget, brother - Shadow Beat'.

The photo was him and Shadow smiling at the camera at a field. Swifty held the frame close to him and closed his eyes for a few moments.

'Wherever you are, I'll never forget' he thought.

Swifty put on his earphones, played a song from the music player and began to fall into a deep asleep whilst holding the picture close to his chest.


End file.
